scholarly journals Pragmatic Language Processing in the Adolescent Brain

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Salomi S. Asaridou ◽  
Ö. Ece Demir-Lira ◽  
Julia Uddén ◽  
Susan Goldin-Meadow ◽  
Steven L. Small
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Cognitive Processing ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Pragmatic Competence ◽  
Pragmatic Language ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Preceding Question

Adolescence is a developmental period in which social interactions become increasingly important. Successful social interactions rely heavily on pragmatic competence, the appropriate use of language in different social contexts, a skill that is still developing in adolescence. In the present study, we used fMRI to characterize the brain networks underlying pragmatic language processing in typically developing adolescents. We used an indirect speech paradigm whereby participants were presented with question/answer dialogues in which the meaning of the answer had to be inferred from the context, in this case the preceding question. Participants were presented with three types of answers: (1) direct replies, i.e., simple answers to open-ended questions, (2) indirect informative replies, i.e., answers in which the speaker’s intention was to add more information to a yes/no question, and (3) indirect affective replies, i.e., answers in which the speaker’s intention was to express polite refusals, negative opinions or to save face in response to an emotionally charged question. We found that indirect affective replies elicited the strongest response in brain areas associated with language comprehension (superior temporal gyri), theory of mind (medial prefrontal cortex, temporo-parietal junction, and precuneus), and attention/working memory (inferior frontal gyri). The increased activation to indirect affective as opposed to indirect informative and direct replies potentially reflects the high salience of opinions and perspectives of others in adolescence. Our results add to previous findings on socio-cognitive processing in adolescents and extend them to pragmatic language comprehension.

The Opposition of Surprisal and Semantic Similarity in the Prediction of Language Processing: Evidence from Eye-tracking Data

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kun Sun
Keyword(s):  
Eye Tracking ◽  
Semantic Similarity ◽  
Cognitive Processing ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Word Processing ◽  
Reading Time ◽  
Computational Models ◽  
Tracking Data ◽  
Dynamic Approach

Expectations or predictions about upcoming content play an important role during language comprehension and processing. One important aspect of recent studies of language comprehension and processing concerns the estimation of the upcoming words in a sentence or discourse. Many studies have used eye-tracking data to explore computational and cognitive models for contextual word predictions and word processing. Eye-tracking data has previously been widely explored with a view to investigating the factors that influence word prediction. However, these studies are problematic on several levels, including the stimuli, corpora, statistical tools they applied. Although various computational models have been proposed for simulating contextual word predictions, past studies usually preferred to use a single computational model. The disadvantage of this is that it often cannot give an adequate account of cognitive processing in language comprehension. To avoid these problems, this study draws upon a massive natural and coherent discourse as stimuli in collecting the data on reading time. This study trains two state-of-art computational models (surprisal and semantic (dis)similarity from word vectors by linear discriminative learning (LDL)), measuring knowledge of both the syntagmatic and paradigmatic structure of language. We develop a `dynamic approach' to compute semantic (dis)similarity. It is the first time that these two computational models have been merged. Models are evaluated using advanced statistical methods. Meanwhile, in order to test the efficiency of our approach, one recently developed cosine method of computing semantic (dis)similarity based on word vectors data adopted is used to compare with our `dynamic' approach. The two computational and fixed-effect statistical models can be used to cross-verify the findings, thus ensuring that the result is reliable. All results support that surprisal and semantic similarity are opposed in the prediction of the reading time of words although both can make good predictions. Additionally, our `dynamic' approach performs better than the popular cosine method. The findings of this study are therefore of significance with regard to acquiring a better understanding how humans process words in a real-world context and how they make predictions in language cognition and processing.

scholarly journals Understanding Contextual and Social Meaning in Typically Developing Finnish-Speaking Four- To Eight-Year-Old Children

2017 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 408-428 ◽  
Author(s):  
Soile Loukusa ◽  
Leena Mäkinen ◽  
Ilaria Gabbatore ◽  
Päivi Laukkanen-Nevala ◽  
Eeva Leinonen
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Pragmatic Language ◽  
Social Meaning ◽  
Developmental Phase ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Mind Reading ◽  
Contextual Processing ◽  
Pragmatic Comprehension

Abstract This study examined the development of social-pragmatic comprehension in 170 Finnish four- to eight-year-old children. The children were asked to respond to socially and contextually demanding questions targeting their social-pragmatic language processing, and to explain their correct answers in order to elicit their awareness of how they had derived the answers from the context. The results showed that the number of correct answers increased especially between the ages of four and seven years. We found that questions demanding contextual processing without mind-reading were the easiest to understand, followed by questions demanding processing of feelings of others and false beliefs. The questions demanding understanding of relevant language use and processing of contextual factors including mental states and intentions were the most challenging for the children. Between four and five years of age there was a remarkable developmental phase in children’s ability to give proper explanations.

scholarly journals Overview of MEG

2016 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 95-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Seppo P. Ahlfors ◽  
Maria Mody
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Processing ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Reading Ability ◽  
Experimental Conditions ◽  
Localization Accuracy ◽  
Spoken Language Processing ◽  
Processing Techniques ◽  
Attention And Perception ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Signal Processing Techniques

Magnetoencephalography (MEG) is a method to study electrical activity in the human brain by recording the neuromagnetic field outside the head. MEG, like electroencephalography (EEG), provides an excellent, millisecond-scale time resolution, and allows the estimation of the spatial distribution of the underlying activity, in favorable cases with a localization accuracy of a few millimeters. To detect the weak neuromagnetic signals, superconducting sensors, magnetically shielded rooms, and advanced signal processing techniques are used. The analysis and interpretation of MEG data typically involves comparisons between subject groups and experimental conditions using various spatial, temporal, and spectral measures of cortical activity and connectivity. The application of MEG to cognitive neuroscience studies is illustrated with studies of spoken language processing in subjects with normal and impaired reading ability. The mapping of spatiotemporal patterns of activity within networks of cortical areas can provide useful information about the functional architecture of the brain related to sensory and cognitive processing, including language, memory, attention, and perception.

scholarly journals POEM-based SofLP’s Inculcation: A Way of Improving EFL Students’ Pragmatic Competence

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 245
Author(s):  
Yohannes Telaumbanua
Keyword(s):  
Digital Media ◽  
Retrieval Practice ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Pragmatic Competence ◽  
Pragmatic Language ◽  
Factual Knowledge ◽  
Knowledge Domains ◽  
Iterative Model ◽  
Efl Students ◽  
Field Notes

The facts disclosed that some Indonesian ED students have difficulty disassembling the SIM in a practical sense. The scopes, focusing on merely learning factual knowledge of linguistic pragmatics and plus discussing the Western-based cases in point provided which are contrary to the Indonesian ED students’ real-world life social contexts, are the major quandaries of the students’ difficulties. The researcher, therefore, proposed such a title to practically bridge the students’ critical quandaries in interpreting the SIM. This was a qualitative method whose complete participation, field-notes, interviews, and iterative model and the 1984 Miles and Huberman Interactive model were the techniques of collecting and analysing the data respectively. The principal results practically signified that the poem-based SofLP’s inculcation better improve the Indonesian ED students’ pragmatic competence, HOTs (cognitive process and knowledge domains), linguistic intelligence and language skills. Besides, through poem, the pragmatic language teacher is encouraged to exploit the instructional strategies to establish and develop the students’ space practice, retrieval practice, elaboration, and collaboration. In conclusion, even though it seems weird, the poem or other literary works and digital media can critically serve as the learning media assisting the students acquire the SofLP.

Language Comprehension and Emotion

2019 ◽  
pp. 735-766
Author(s):  
Jos J. A. van Berkum
Keyword(s):  
Computational Complexity ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Language Use ◽  
Human Cognition ◽  
Language Interpretation ◽  
The Brain

When you hear somebody speak, or read a bit of text, you are somehow assigning meaning to an unfolding sequence of signs. Because of the representational and computational complexity involved, this process of language interpretation is considered to be one of the major feats of human cognition. However, you also happen to be just another mammal, and as such, you are biologically predisposed to have emotions, evaluations, and moods (i.e. to feel certain things about your environment). How do these two acts of assigning meaning relate to one another? And what are the implications for neurolinguistics, the endeavor to understand how the brain realizes language use? After examining why emotion is not naturally foregrounded in language processing research, this chapter reviews some basic insights in emotion science, discusses a processing model of affective language comprehension, and explores how the model can contribute to neurolinguistics and other fields.

scholarly journals Valence of social information is encoded in different subpopulations of mushroom body Kenyon cells in the honeybee brain

2019 ◽  
Vol 286 (1910) ◽  
pp. 20190901 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian M. Traniello ◽  
Zhenqing Chen ◽  
Vikram A. Bagchi ◽  
Gene E. Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Social Information ◽  
Fundamental Property ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Early Gene ◽  
Evolutionary Divergence ◽  
Neural Activation ◽  
Positive And Negative Valence ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Honeybee Brain

Over 600 Myr of evolutionary divergence between vertebrates and invertebrates is associated with considerable neuroanatomical variation both across and within these lineages. By contrast, valence encoding is an important behavioural trait that is evolutionarily conserved across vertebrates and invertebrates, and enables individuals to distinguish between positive (potentially beneficial) and negative (potentially harmful) situations. We tested the hypothesis that social interactions of positive and negative valence are modularly encoded in the honeybee brain (i.e. encoded in different cellular subpopulations) as in vertebrate brains. In vertebrates, neural activation patterns are distributed across distinct parts of the brain, suggesting that discrete circuits encode positive or negative stimuli. Evidence for this hypothesis would suggest a deep homology of neural organization between insects and vertebrates for valence encoding, despite vastly different brain sizes. Alternatively, overlapping localization of valenced social information in the brain would imply a ‘re-use' of circuitry in response to positive and negative social contexts, potentially to overcome the energetic constraints of a tiny brain. We used immediate early gene expression to map positively and negatively valenced social interactions in the brain of the western honeybee Apis mellifera . We found that the valence of a social signal is represented by distinct anatomical subregions of the mushroom bodies, an invertebrate sensory neuropil associated with social behaviour, multimodal sensory integration, learning and memory. Our results suggest that the modularization of valenced social information in the brain is a fundamental property of neuroanatomical organization.

The Effect of Background Music on Cognitive Performance in Musicians and Nonmusicians

2011 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucy L. M. Patston ◽  
Lynette J. Tippett
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Cognitive Abilities ◽  
Search Task ◽  
Piano Music ◽  
Background Music ◽  
Visuospatial Task ◽  
Comprehension Task ◽  
Music And Language ◽  
The Brain

there is debate about the extent of overlap between music and language processing in the brain and whether these processes are functionally independent in expert musicians. A language comprehension task and a visuospatial search task were administered to 36 expert musicians and 36 matched nonmusicians in conditions of silence and piano music played correctly and incorrectly. Musicians performed more poorly on the language comprehension task in the presence of background music compared to silence, but there was no effect of background music on the musicians' performance on the visuospatial task. In contrast, the performance of nonmusicians was not affected by music on either task. The findings challenge the view that music and language are functionally independent in expert musicians, and instead suggest that when musicians process music they recruit a network that overlaps with the network used in language processing. Additionally, musicians outperformed nonmusicians on both tasks, reflecting either a general cognitive advantage in musicians or enhancement of more specific cognitive abilities such as processing speed or executive functioning.

The Search for Common Ground

2004 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 891-903 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kathryn Kohnert ◽  
Jennifer Windsor
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Processing ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Impairment ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Visual Detection ◽  
Typically Developing ◽  
Response Latencies ◽  
English Only ◽  
Primary Language Impairment ◽  
The Difference

Below-average performance on some nonlinguistic tasks often is considered a potential correlate of primary language impairment (LI). If nonlinguistic cognitive processing truly is deficient in children with LI, then measures may be identified that distinguish language learners at risk for LI that are independent of the number and type of languages learned. This study focuses on within- and across-stask performance on 4 basic nonlinguistic processing tasks. The aim was to systematically investigate areas of potential overlap and divergence among 3 groups of linguistically diverse children: English-only speakers with LI, typically developing English-only speakers (EO), and typically developing bilingual Spanish—English speakers (BI). The performance of the 100 8–13-year-old children who took part in J. Windsor and K. Kohnert’s (2004) study was analyzed. Experimental tasks were simple and choice versions of auditory- and visual-detection tasks. Each task included 4 levels of motor difficulty: responfficient or faulty language-processing skills). ding with the preferred and nonpreferred hand and foot. Analyses revealed no significant differences among groups in simple auditory detection. The EO group was significantly faster than the LI group in each of the other 3 tasks. While the same pattern was evident for the BI group, the difference was significant only in choice visual detection. Overall patterns of response latency within and across tasks were qualitatively similar across the 3 groups. Development, indexed here by chronological age, played a significant role in predicting response latencies for children in all 3 groups.

scholarly journals Language and the Brain: A Twofold Study of Language Production and Language Comprehension as a Separate or Integrated Set of Processes

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 (5) ◽  
pp. 82-90
Author(s):  
Anokye Bernice
Keyword(s):  
Language Processing ◽  
Language Comprehension ◽  
Language Production ◽  
Research Work ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Brain Regions ◽  
Inner Voice ◽  
Linguistic Rules ◽  
Underlying Basis ◽  
The Brain

Humans can understand their language due to the processes in the brain. It is very easy for language users to presume that language production and language comprehension are two simple phenomena. For psycholinguistics, these two processes are part of the three core topics in the study of the language and the mind. Psycholinguistics attempt to have a model that explains how language is processed in our brain. It is nearly impossible to do or think about anything without using language, whether this entails following a set of written instructions or an internal talk-through by your inner voice. Language permeates our brains and our lives like no other skill. Beforehand, psycholinguists described our comprehension and production of language in terms of the rules that were hypothesized by linguists (Fodor, Bever, & Garrett, 1974). Now, that is not the case. These linguistic rules inform rather than taking precedent in studying language and the brain. This paper aims to describe the brain regions/structures, language processes, and the intricate connections between them. The study discusses the brain as the underlying basis of the relationship between language and the brain. Moreover, this study descriptively analyses some of the recent expositive psycholinguistic research on language production and comprehension in order to understand the nature and dynamics of language. The methodology of this paper has to do with the research design, materials and concludes with descriptive analyses of the major finding from the secondary data reviewed in the paper. The linguistic approaches used for this study do not entail any sort of calculation or enumeration. It takes the form of a descriptive qualitative approach or a desktop study where research work mainly capitalizes on preexisting literature in the research domain. The study's main finding reveals that research works on language processing treat production and comprehension as quite distinct from each other. Language production processes differ fundamentally from comprehension processes in many respects. However, other researchers reject such a dichotomy. In its place, they propose that producing and understanding are tightly interwoven, and this interweaving underlies people’s ability to predict themselves and each other.

scholarly journals Social-vocal brain networks in a non-human primate

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Daniel Y Takahashi ◽  
Ahmed El Hady ◽  
Yisi S Zhang ◽  
Diana A Liao ◽  
Gabriel Montaldo ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Social Interactions ◽  
Social Communication ◽  
Vocal Communication ◽  
Brain Network ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Distributed Network ◽  
Social Brain ◽  
Cortical Regions ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Human Primate

During social interactions, individuals influence each other to coordinate their actions. Vocal communication is an exceptionally efficient way to exert such influence. Where and how social interactions are dynamically modulated in the brain is unknown. We used functional ultrasound imaging in marmoset monkeys, a highly vocal species, to investigate the dynamics of medial social brain areas in vocal perception, production, and audio-vocal interaction. We found that the activity of a distributed network of subcortical and cortical regions distinguishes calls associated with different social contexts. This same brain network showed different dynamics during externally and internally driven vocalizations. These findings suggest the existence of a social-vocal brain network in medial cortical and subcortical areas that is fundamental in social communication.

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